"23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.25 And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria." (2 Kings 2)

The above is from a book whose proponents and followers say qualifies them for moral superiority. Note that the prophet did this "in the name of the Lord" all because the poor prophet was being picked on. In other words his god stood behind and fulfilled this curse. If you are going to say, "well this is the old testament". Then please explain your unchanging god to me again. This reminds me of so many xians who find comfort, amusement, and soul satisfying vengeance in thinking their opponents are going to hell for an eternity of torture.

Simply more evidence that the bible is not a moral book nor is it a book inspired by a god, but is simply a work of men's vain imaginings. I emphasis men as it is also a book that when followed subverts women's rights and aspirations as well.

So the next time xians raise their baseless and simple minded charge that morally despicable things now take place in schools because token acts of piety are no longer forced upon our kids, I hope they will take an introspective look at their book's often vapid moral landscape. Is that all their god requires for appeasement, an insincere meaningless outward show? It seems that is what they are demanding. What of the shootings in churches, in prayer services for their god's sake? What of the other horrid acts that take place in their midst like molestation and ... ? Did these occur because they did not have enough god in their church? I know the vast majority didn't sanction these acts, but yet they still happened despite the faithful believing majority.

At the end of the day if their god is omnipotent then their god holds responsibility for the evil that is visited upon innocents. Just as I would be rightly judged as guilty standing by drinking my tea watching a child die from a cause I could easily prevent simply because I thought their parents brought this upon themselves and their children, likewise is their god equally guilty for doing the same. Their god is full of holes. Their god is no more than the adult version of an imaginary friend. We can do better morally and we have.

Is this post offensive, I hope it is. I hope the offense forces you to think about what you truly believe and why. I hope it precipitates some serious life introspection. Someone mortally offending my beliefs was the greatest intellectual gift ever given me. Don't cower under faith as your only excuse for belief. Why is it when it comes to religion serious critical thinking is so often frowned upon but yet when not employed in life's other endeavors that person is looked upon as foolish?

My husband and I were bouncing conspicuously through the dessert in a camouflage jeep. We were quickly approaching the barricade of armed soldiers ahead of us. As they moved into a defensive array, my husband and I gave each other a knowing look; I would do the talking and he would stay back in his threateningly masculine form until our identity was confirmed and our purpose was understood. We were there to pray, and people on the inside knew us from the underground church that we began. We certainly wouldn’t be shot, and our children were secure back at the safe house where they taught Jesus to the other children on this long missionary journey among strangers. It was my greatest hope as a mother that our children would grow up to become trained missionaries with an excellent knowledge of the bible.

Such were the collective dreams of our fundamental family. We would leave the possibility of the kids going to college behind, rip them away from the rest of the family, and head to the harshest of lands. All education was tainted by evil secularism anyway, and our main agenda while on this earth was simply to preach the gospel and practice the art of persuasion. Our children had the same dreams that we did because they were second generation brainwashed. Their idea of success was the act of leading another little kid to the Lord.

Brainwashing the kids happened easily because we believed in our own delusions. We believed we were teaching them the vital truth of human existence. But debriefing them from our old fundamental mission took a bit more time. Instead of teaching them from Voice of the Martyrs, which only focuses on Christian persecution, I started teaching them bits and pieces about all the persecuted people groups in the world. I exposed them to humanitarian accomplishments of peace makers in the world. It opened up their eyes to human value and human rights. Their beliefs now are sort of in-between human rights and a contradictory, light form of Christianity. I started providing them with secular books and magazines and multicultural and religious media. They made comparisons, and a little light came on inside them. Instead of telling them what to believe, I began asking them questions about what they each felt was the right way to treat another human being. Thankfully, their answers were humanitarian ones. I also told them that I would love and accept them no matter what they chose to believe. Our family would never be divided based on beliefs.

The two who were being raised to assimilate are older now, and I am so proud of them. It tickles me that they excel in academics, especially math and science, and that they are active in extra-curricular activities and the arts. I look at them and I see a successful mission. I see people who will make a kinder and a more empathetic world and offer it real solutions instead of another cause for war. I see children who have grown out of circumstances that many never escape. I am a happy mama. Perhaps I am happier than most.

I know our relationship ended about a year ago, but lately I find myself thinking a lot about you. The breathing room this year has given me has been amazing, let me tell you! Now, I can let my mind soar free without having to ask your permission—or beg your forgiveness if my thoughts were not holy enough for your divine tastes.

In recent weeks, I’ve been thinking about our anniversary—the anniversary of our relationship’s demise, that is. It seems like it’s some kind of cosmic joke that this particular date nestles itself within that buffer week between Christmas and New Year’s. I got to break up with you on your internationally-recognized birthday. Then I got to start my new life without you on the celebration of new beginnings. At the realization of this most excellent irony, I would ordinarily exclaim your Father’s name in vain if I were still on speaking terms with Him.

I will not trivialize our relationship, however, because you had a profound impact on me. I mean, after hearing so much about you during my childhood and then committing my life to you in 2001, you were quite literally the center of my little Christian world.

When I had no friends, you assured me that you were the best friend anyone could have. When I felt the weight of my teenage angst bearing down on me, when my susceptibility to depression teetered dangerously at the edge of despair, you were there for me. You told me if I only held on to the hope of your eternal kingdom, none of this would matter.

You dangled heaven in front of my eyes, and I chased it; hand-in-hand with you, I ran. And though I tried not to think of it, hell was always licking at my heels. You knew that, didn’t you?

I was all a part of your plan, after all. Adam, Eve, sin, and salvation. You made up the rules.

You made me feel grateful that you were my safety net, the only thing keeping me from spiraling into the terrifying oblivion of hell. You created a reality that would doom the vast majority of mankind, your own children.

Now, I don’t mean to sound self-righteous before you, but I must interject with a certain humble opinion. Personally, if I knew that many of my hypothetical children would end up dying in the most horrifying methods imaginable, I would completely refrain from having children, even if their brutal deaths were the result of their own free will. According to my mortal judgment, this would be the most merciful decision.

However, you essentially created a trap. You, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, set up the rules of salvation like a sadistic scheming villain, wringing his hands and laughing ominously at the creatures placed at his mercy. And then, you demanded your creatures’ love and undying devotion if they wish to avoid an eternity in the flames.

It didn’t have to be this way. You, Oh Omnipotent Being, could have created a different reality. You didn’t have to plant the tree; you didn’t have to tempt your first offspring to disobedience. But you did, and you were fully aware of the consequences. At the very least, you could have prevented sin from becoming genetically heritable. But you didn’t.

Considering how much you meant to me, it seems needless to mention that our breakup shattered me to the core. The fractures in my worldview cracked into insurmountable chasms before my eyes. I watched helplessly as confusion and terror struck me in waves of seismic proportions.

As an all-powerful deity, you must have already known that our relationship was slowly descending into an eventual doom ever since my freshman year of college.

Oh sure, I’d had my doubts about your integrity as a deity and as relationship material before. But those doubts came in short, unpredictable bursts, like hiccups, that quickly disintegrated without a trace.

But when the "logic" of creationist websites was not longer an adequate stand-in for the cold facts of science, those hiccups grew into great, unyielding spasms. I could not free myself. My evolution studies just made so much sense. It sickened me to admit it, even to myself.

Of course, I turned to you; this was my first instinct. But as much as I begged and pleaded with you to make this make sense, you became rather aloof. Instead of offering a reasonable explanation, you demanded my blind acceptance of your Word.

I tried and tried to mend our relationship. I knew that if I broke up with you, I would be destined to an eternity in the lake of fire. But the thing is, I didn’t want to break up with you because of the many vices that can tempt man away from his savior. I didn’t walk away because I loved to sin. I didn’t walk away because I was attached to money or material goods. I didn’t do it to spite you. My rejection of you is intellectual. And while evolution sparked my search for the truth, I found many other topics that I took issue with. I simply could not trust the integrity of your Word. When I discussed its believability with fellow Christians, I was consistently advised to put aside my intellect and make a leap of faith into your protective arms. This I simply could not do. Even when I prayed to you, I could not convince myself of the truth of your Word. After all, if Adam and Eve were demonstrably non-existent, then how can I accept the salvation your relationship offers, when it is based on an Original Sin that did not exist?

Do I really deserve to roast eternally for such thoughts? To be thrown into the same pit of punishment as Satan, who apparently rejected you based on his pride and greed? Have I committed the unforgivable sin of thinking?

As our relationship waned, I descended into a state of constant internal terror. I was terrorized with the thought of hell. But even worse than this hypothetical hell, was the certainty of losing my purpose in life and even my understanding of my own humanity.

In a desperate attempt to salvage what was left of our relationship, I attended a Christian conference around Christmas time last year with an evangelical student organization. The attendees at the conference, students and leaders alike, were True Believers. They trusted you completely, and felt your presence tangibly. If I were to heal our dysfunctional relationship, this was the place to do it.

To my disappointment, I discovered that the basis behind their zeal for you was a vast, complicated web of emotional and psychological rationalizations. They did not require intellectual answers because their emotions shaped the platform of their belief, though they would never admit this.

I was also equally shocked and horrified to witness the emotional manipulation lacing every sermon and every seminar, like poison. And the students, two-thousand of them, guzzled it up like water.

The first person to hear me deny you with the proclamation “I am an Atheist” was an old pastor at the conference. He will never know what a pivotal role he played in our breakup. He was the last straw. He tried to answer my questions regarding creation with the same false, pseudo-scientific arguments that I had heard over and over.

As soon as I said, “I am an Atheist,” something inside me broke. Some barrier. Saying something out loud somehow makes it more real. That sentence felt so alien to my tongue, though I had shamefully admitted it to myself in thought.

It was surprisingly easy to duplicate this confession to my best friend who accompanied me to the conference. But even though it was easy to deny you out loud, it was very difficult to let go of you entirely.

How could I come to terms with my insignificant existence? For without a god, our species is nothing more than a microscopic blip lost in a vast, eternal space. This was a terrifying thought to me, one that caused me to tumble full-force into depression.

Who am I? Why am I even alive? What does my existence amount to in the absence of an objective deity? These philosophical inquiries haunted my every waking moment.

I have since come to terms with my own insignificance and have learned to see freedom and beauty in light of this perspective.

A year later, it is you who continues to haunt my thoughts, jabbing me with what-ifs and inflicting my imagination with creative images of hell.

You need not expend your energy on me, however, as you seem to have plenty of devoted followers, each of whom professes a unique relationship with you. You have your hands full with all of them.

I, on the other hand, will make do with trading the comforting illusion of a divine relationship for the steely, unapologetic truth.

My parents were both atheist, and had never taught us kids any of the tenets of Christianity. At age 11, we moved next to a Christian family. The wife asked my mother if they could take her children to a vacation bible school. My mother was all too happy to have a few hours of peace, and relinquished her brood to the woman who would become “the sweet old Christian woman next door” in my “how I got saved” testimony. My parents would come to rue that day. As an adult, I found that the church we went to was the Plymouth Brethren denomination, a strict sect of Christianity with an oppressive doctrine concerning women. Of course, they tricked the young Daniel into reciting the sinner’s prayer (what 11 year old wants to go to hell?). For the next several years, I was indoctrinated with the Bible, and their interpretation of it. The church had many people who, if I met today, would be considered crazy. But back then it seemed like they were the more spiritual ones. Being a red-blooded American teenager in the 1970s, the cares of the world pulled me away and by age 17 was not attending at all. But the brand was made – I was a Christian, and was well-grounded in the Bible, and able to recite verses to the tune of evangelical fundamentalism.
In the Army Now

As a senior in high school, a friend got me to attend a church called Unity. The youth group had a lot of cool guys and girls in it, and it felt comfortable. But they did not teach the same Jesus as the Plymouth Brethren church. I wrote them off as a cult (like I would know?). But like I said, it was cool. I continued building friendships there until I joined the Army for lack of jobs for high school grads in the late 70s Midwestern America.

In the Army, I was just an average GI. I was easily influenced by the more experienced soldiers. I started drinking beer and hard liquor and smoking marijuana. In the mean time, I had met a sergeant, Enrique, who was known as an annoying Christian who took every chance to infect normal conversations with his religious views. I was assigned to work for him on a job, and he would preach and quote Bible passages to me. One day he was telling me that “by grace are we saved through faith.” I could not help but append, “Ephesians 2:8”. He was impressed, and started heavily targeting me for conversion, inviting me to the Bible study he led in his home. I attended a few, but eventually he got orders for overseas, and I was glad to get him out of my life. When he left, he sold a car to me.

Turning to the Straight and Narrow

I had a yearning to find a wife and build a life and family, and soon realized that getting drunk and stoned all the time was not a good strategy to attain that end. When I considered where I might find a wife, the idea of church and Christianity always entered my mind as the most viable approach. In order to make myself as attractive as I could for a potential bride, I decided I would return to Christianity and clean myself up. So I started hanging with the few Christians in my outfit, and stopped the drinking and smoking. After a year had past, I was in “full steam ahead” mode for Christianity, although still no closer to finding a mate. I heard from a coworker that Enrique had gotten out of the service to be a full time pastor (although he had no education beyond high school – but, as Enrique would point out – neither did Peter, James or John). I wanted Enrique to know that his efforts to bring me to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ were not in vain, and that I was a bona fide born-again washed-by-the-blood-of-the-Lamb Christian.

A Man of God and the Doctrine of Grace

Enrique was staying at the home of a soldier in the same outfit I was in. I left several messages for him to call me, but he did not. I later found out that he suspected I thought he had cheated in the car deal, wanted money back (which was never the case), and he avoided calling me. An older and wiser Daniel now sees that he acted this way because he believed that he did cheat me (a clue that I should have ran the other way). Nevertheless, I persisted, and when Enrique found that I was calling for spiritual reasons, I soon was meeting with the small fellowship he was forming. Enrique had convinced me that the Christianity that I had been taught my whole life was based on a lie – the lie is that man can decide for himself whether to accept Jesus or not (Arminianism). The truth was that God chooses those whom he will save. As a matter of fact, this was decided before the foundation of the world was laid. You may recognize this as Calvinism. Here again, unless a Christian comes to a revelation that he/she is one of God’s chosen, then they aren’t a real Christian. The many Bible verses that support this doctrine were pounded into me. Since I believed this Doctrine of Grace, I must be one of God’s chosen. I felt special, even invincible. And our leader, now referred to as Brother Enrique, had a small contingency of followers with which to build his empire.
With Us or Against Us

Brother Enrique taught that the Lord God required our full allegiance. So giving allegiance to anyone or anything else was considered idolatry. You can imagine the conflict then for a member of the armed forces who has given their allegiance to the United States, manifested in the form of a salute to a flag. Yes, a seemingly innocent salute to the United States flag had become an adulterous act against the Almighty God of Creation. It wasn’t long before I was convinced that God wanted me out of the service of a godless nation. Brother Enrique taught that America was the Great Whore of Babylon, and that her destruction, detailed in the Book of Revelation, was imminent. I had to get out of the military and work in full time service of God, building the ministry so that God’s people would have a place of refuge when certain destruction comes upon the nation. But instead of asking for a discharge based on conscientious objection, I dove in head first with refusal to salute the flag based on religious views of idolatry.
Modern Day Third Chapter of Daniel

You can imagine the reactions of my First Sergeant and Unit Commander as I explained to them my dilemma, essentially calling them idolaters, asking them to approve my discharge. I honestly thought that I could explain it so well and their response would be, “Oh, well that’s a horse of a different color! Thank you for your sincerity – goodbye and good luck!” After all, it could not be more clear. The parallels to the third chapter of the Book of Daniel were absolutely uncanny. It could not be a coincidence. Babylon was America. Nebuchadnezzar’s 90 foot golden statue was the flag. The “sound of the cornet” was the Star Spangled Banner. The bowing was the salute. I was Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. I was one of God’s chosen and in the middle of something eternally sensational.
Persecuted for the Sake of the Gospel

But the Army did not let me go. In fact, quite the opposite. I was sent to an Army psychologist, whose diagnosis stated that I suffered from a personality disorder which left me unable to use my emotions properly, driving me to religion. He also said I was borderline psychotic and that lines were blurred between what was real and what was not. One morning shortly thereafter, a “surprise” open ranks inspection was called in a parking lot that happened to be in full view of unit headquarters. But for some reason, the flag had not yet been raised, even though the work day had begun. While the officer in charge of the open ranks inspection was going about his duty, two soldiers exited the HQ building with the flag. They attached it to the flag pole draw rope and raised it. The officer in charge called the unit to attention and gave the order to salute. I stood my ground and “obeyed God rather than man.” When it was over, the Army had what they needed: the troublemaking soldier had deliberately disobeyed the order of an officer, with more witnesses than they needed. I was tried by court martial, found guilty, sentenced to loss of all rank, forfeiture of all pay, and to four months confinement with hard labor. After I served the prison sentence, I was given a general discharge. But to me, I was in the fiery furnace, and the Son of Man was there with me. In the mean time, Brother Enrique received more than his 15 minutes of fame, appearing on radio shows and being interviewed by TV stations. Upon my discharge, I was free to be a servant of The Most High, and lived and worked in the middle of the Mohave dessert at the ministry compound which consisted of one 60x12 mobile home with no electricity or running water. I stayed in that situation for the next 8 months. That’s how long it took me to see Brother Enrique for who he really was, see his real motives, and realize that unless I left, I would never be the person who I could potentially become.

Weeding out the Truth

When I left, I had to come to terms with what had happened to me, and sort out what was real and what was made up. I feared for my life because after I had announced that I was leaving, Brother Enrique had a dream in which I was a lifeless, ghostly figure. Was he really a Man of God, and was I in rebellion? Would God end my life to protect me from Satan? In the end, I convinced myself that Brother Enrique was a false prophet, but that all that I had learned from studying the Word of God was truth. So I embraced Calvinism. Also, I could not believe that God would have brought me through the flag ordeal for nothing. After joining a “real” Calvinistic church, I thought that I could explain my flag revelation to “real” Christians, and help them to learn truth. After several years of that, I learned to keep my mouth shut about it. It took another 30 years to begin to doubt the reality of Christianity and come to terms with my own foolishness over the flag issue.
Played the Fool

I recently read “The Gift of the Blessing” by Gary Smalley. I was stunned to learn that people with poor relationships with their father, such as the one I had with mine, left those people susceptible to joining cults. The cult leader cunningly provides the elements missing from the real father, and the gullible fool gets bamboozled. In looking back at the multiple instances where I had the opportunity to either continue convincing myself that I had faith on the same scale as Abraham, or to shut up and get real, I see now that I was the fool. Today, I can recite all the ways that my life has been enhanced by Christianity, including an ideal marriage, successfully raising three great kids, the influence to pursue higher education, and the list goes on. Would I have these things without Christianity? I will never know. But I do know I can also point to a massive, embarrassing stain on my life, and now an awakening from a 30-year delusion, all thanks to Christianity.

The Tower, a tarot card that strikes fear into Tarot card readers and their clients, the very sight of this card invokes fear, anxiety and terror. It is the beginning of the reaping, the end has come all hell has broken loose, you have nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, and the world that you have built is crumbing, struck down by the hand of god, in this case a lightning bolt. We meet two people in this picture, a couple, both of whom are diving headfirst into what appears to be a sudden and possibly untimely death.

The Tower is the source of all human fear; it is everything about sudden and violent change or events including, but not limited to, sudden upheavals, revolts, events such as divorce, expulsion, suspension, job termination, possibly a change of location, even having a change of world-view. The Tower is not only a change in the physical, but also the mental. It can symbolize having your world view changed suddenly, through college, work, poverty, childhood, adulthood, the teen years, death, sickness, or even a sudden realization about your social, political, or even religious beliefs.

In the United States, be you young, middle aged or in your senior years , being a black man in the United States has always come with a large amount of baggage ranging from , but not limited to, racial profiling, a widely overblown, tainted , and over-hyped media image, and religion. For over a century, black men, women, children and elders adopted a laundry list of religious beliefs and organizations following the civil war and reconstruction including, but not limited to, Catholicism, Mormonism, Islam, and Christianity. This is not to say that black men and women didn't adopt Atheism, or any of the belief systems that would fall under the left hand path such as Satanism, Voodoo, Luciferianism, Wicca, and Santeria, however, I can safely say that the number of black men and women who will openly admit to practicing any of these belief systems is In the extreme minority when compared to their white counterparts in the United States or even Europe.

It is extremely difficult for me to write this, as I will cover a large amount of subjects that will help explain race and religion. Many of you who have always wanted to know about the black church and its large role within the black community over last century alone. Well, I'll start with myself; I am a twenty-six year old man, born in Bamberg, Germany, the middle child and second son of a mom and dad who have been married for almost thirty years. I wouldn't say that I was raised in the church when compared to my parents, grandparents or even great grandparents for that matter, however, when you grow up in a black family, you are more than likely surrounded by family members that are heavily entrenched the church and you have probably gone to church a few times with grandma and grandpa. There are multiple reasons why the Christian church and the bible were adopted by black families. One was a result of slavery, following the civil war and in the midst of reconstruction; many blacks had the religion of their slave master beaten into them, not just physically but also emotionally and mentally. Another reason that I feel should be mentioned is survival. Throughout the 19th century and twentieth century, black families often escaped the extreme and often deadly violence of Jim Crow laws in the U.S through churches, but even then, churches were not off limits the vile and inhuman terror tactics of murder, torture, bombings, intimidation, and cross burnings used by groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, who often hid behind the same Christian values, bible and cross that that they used and burned to further their often twisted and extremist ideology . Living in Oklahoma, one of many states in the Bible belt, I know this all too well. In 1921, the Greenwood district, which was an area full of thriving large businesses, was completely destroyed during what is described as a massacre by survivors. The events in Greenwood were dubbed a “race riot”, but the survivors, many of whom have passed on, say that it was a mass murder. The events in Greenwood had all the signs of the murder and genocide that is usually fueled by hatred of an entire group of people who have done nothing to warrant this animosity, hatred and vitriol outside of simply being born and existing in a country that they had no choice in being brought to centuries earlier by the people who enslaved them.

The black church has always been a major stable within the black community due to the fact that a church sometimes became a means to go to school for some, for others it meant a hot meal, it meant clothing over your back, and it also was a means to meet with family, friends and even a future spouse, so, to an extent, the church did have a hand in forming future relationships and future generations. Over the last four decades, desegregation and the civil rights movement had a massive impact on those who were involved, including the black church, which like many of the people involved, bore the brunt of the wrath of white supremacist groups, state and local governments, police, and even sometimes other pastors and churches who didn't like the idea of men such as Medgar Evers and Martin Luther King Jr. standing as men and not backing down even in the face of such unimaginable violence and hatred. Unfortunately, many of these men involved would die and with them, would go the bravery and fighting spirit that is not found in many men and women in America or around the world for that matter in this day and age.

The black church has always been a major stable within the black community due to the fact that a church sometimes became a means to go to school for some, for others it meant a hot meal, it meant clothing over your back, and it also was a means to meet with family, friends and even a future spouse, so, to an extent, the church did have a hand in forming future relationships and future generations. When all was said and done, black communities to an extent did somewhat enjoy some freedoms in this country, such as being able to work and go to some desegregated grade schools and colleges in some cities and states. However, continuing rampant discrimination in the work field, schools, police brutality, drugs, housing projects, and soon gangs, disease, single mother households, and poverty started to take a brutal toll upon the black community. In the late 1960s black communities across the United States started to become prisons and warzones for the residents who were already struggling to survive and make ends meet and even go to school. A new generation of young black males across the U.S began to form gangs for the purpose of crime and over a four decade period became the new Ku Klux Klan, terrorizing the very elders who fought for them tirelessly for jobs, schools, and basic human rights.

Many of these gangs in large cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York have all claimed that they were protecting their neighborhood, but most already know by now that these gangs were looking for money, power, and their twisted idea of respect. Throughout the 1980s and even now graduation rates for blacks started to slump, dropout rates went through the roof, teen pregnancy took its toll on the women and children who were left in an often cold, uncaring world where the stakes were now higher than before. Gangs, rape, drugs, prostitution, mass incarceration, and homicide, often through the quick pull of a trigger became part of life in black neighborhoods and housing projects. Often, the people caught in the deadly crossfire were unarmed men, women, children, and defenseless families who did nothing to incur the wrath of these ruthless animals. The worst part of this often horrible aspect of life was that the people who were behind this behind mass genocide of their own people often tried to justify their actions by simply doing something they call “charging it to the game”. “It” being wholesale mass murder, robbery, rape, drug dealing and any crime that gang members would commit to bolster their often massive egos and status within these organizations of crime. Some of these gangs actually had the nerve to try and adopt laws and even religion into their twisted form of existence, often trying to use religion as a means to cover up their criminal activity.

In midst of all of this bloody violence, there was always one element that remained in black neighborhoods, and that was the church. Churches they were large in stature, numbers, members and families alike. Sadly, churches were not even safe In the midst of this nightmarish chaos; often times gang members would attend funerals to mourn a member that had been killed, and at times they weren't welcome with open arms and for good reason, rivals would often times open fire at a funeral or even a burial site. Nothing was sacred, and anyone that lived in these neighborhoods or projects was now well aware that a new terror was upon them, and unfortunately, it came in the form of crime, political, corruption and police brutality which would become an unfortunate part of life for many black communities across the United States, and for many, it would tests their understanding of the world this country , the church and even their own purpose in this life and why there is more so much chaos under the cross.

“When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable. ” - Rene Descartes

Many people often think that atheism amounts to a dogmatic assertion that God does not exist; they think that to be an atheist one has to produce absolute proof that there is no God. Most of the time people have this impression that atheists are absolutely certain about the non-existence of God since they claim to know that God does not exist, however this impression is misleading. While there are atheists who claim to be absolutely certain that God does not exist, not all atheists are like this. Most atheists are not committed to the view that the non-existence of God is some kind of axiomatic or self-evident truth, even Richard Dawkins once said that he isn’t 100% certain of the non-existence of God. What most atheists would agree is that the belief in the existence of God is implausible, hence unreasonable belief. Most atheists do not feel compelled to produce and reproduce absolute proof that God does not exist; it would be self-defeating and futile to even true. This is because most things in life cannot be shown to be true by absolute proof, especially in science. Evidences (or lack of) do not necessarily warrant absolute proof, but they support a certain hypothesis by making the hypothesis more reasonable belief. However, in mathematics and logic there is such thing as “absolute proof” such as 2+2 = 4 or the analytic statement “All Bachelors are Unmarried Men” (basically, something is true by definition). If something is self-contradictory, then you have given absolute proof that something is false or incoherent. So if someone shows that God is self-contradictory since his attributes are not consistent with each other (or one of the attributes is incoherent), then that person has given absolute proof that God does not exist.

However, the problem with this approach is that there are many different versions of God from theists to deists. Also, the theist can easily redefine the attributes of God in such a way that it can avoid contradiction. So trying to show that God’s existence is incoherent is a very tough work for atheists, and probably an unnecessary one. What most atheists should focus on is how reasonable the idea the existence of God is. A better way of understanding this is the scale of reasonableness from the least reasonable to highly reasonable. Most scientific theories such as evolution, big bang, cellular theory, atomic theory, and such usually belong to the high end of the scale “highly reasonable”. Fairy tales or rumors that lack evidence tend to belong to the very low end of the scale of “least reasonable” or unreasonable. The existence of a laptop in front of me is something I can reasonably believe in given that I am not hallucinated.

Ultimately, evidence determines where the beliefs end up in the scale of reasonableness. If the evidences and arguments are overwhelming, the beliefs end up in the higher scale; however if the evidence is scant or even overwhelming contrary evidence, then it ends up in the lower scale of reasonableness. For example, the existence of Big Foot ends up in a fairly low scale because the evidence presented are not very strong; these evidence could easily be fraudulent. The skeptic does not have to present absolute proof that Big Foot does not exist, all the skeptic requires is to determine whether or not the belief is reasonably plausible. The skeptic would point out that it is not reasonably plausible since there is a lack of evidence when we reasonably expect to find some. The skeptic justifies this by pointing out that often times we know that an organism almost always comes with groups of other organism to reproduce as a species. If this is the case then we should find a bunch of those same organisms, either dead or alive. If they are dead and not ancient, then we should already find corpses or fossils already which is common for most species. However, we do not find any fossils. While the big foot believer would point out that according to evolution a lot of extinct species may not have remaining fossils left (since they are destroyed by natural causes), the skeptic can retort that this is mostly true for species that have been extinct for an extremely long time. If big foots exists and are alleged to be observed a few decades ago, then their extinction is not long enough to have their fossils destroyed by natural causes.

As we can see from this example, the skeptic has good reasons to expect certain kind of evidence for big-foot. This is because if big foot exists as a living organism, then like most living organisms it should leave traces of its existence behind. However, what about God? It is not inconceivable that God interfere with the natural affairs without leaving behind traces of his existence. In this sense God would be an unfalsifiable or untestable hypothesis. However, there are reasons to believe that this is not entirely true.

Beliefs about the existence of God seem to imply what the universe should look like if God exists. For example, if God is all powerful and benevolent, then it is reasonable to expect that the universe would have scant amount of suffering. Theists often insist that since God gave us free-will to do evil as much as good, suffering is to be expected. However, we know that this does not include natural disasters, diseases, and accidents. Some theists can insist that this is because of sin, but this assumes young-earth creationism which we know isn’t true. Other theists can argue that God has a purpose for these natural disasters, the purpose leads to higher goods. Theists like William Lane Craig would dismiss suffering as an issue, since he believes that the relationship between human and God is purely spiritual, which does not pertain to anything physical. We can go on about this, but many of these responses have not been convincing. This is because many of them use ad-hoc reasoning. Things like higher purpose or “purely spiritual relationships” themselves lack justification, so we have no reason to accept these as good explanations.

Another good example is the argument from design, many people believed this long time ago (and still to this day) because they genuinely believe that natural causes cannot account for complexity and patterns of life. While they might admit that something like a snowflakes can be produced by clouds, they insist that there is nothing like a cloud that can design life the similar way; this is because life is far more complex than a mere snowflake. A famous proponent of this view was William Paley, who made a brilliant argument that even impressed Charles Darwin before he rejected it. Hundreds of years ago, I might have believed in this argument, however nowadays we can no longer depend on the argument from design anymore. This is because there is an independent and well-supported account on the complexity of life, namely natural selection. Some theists can argue all they want, but if they want to reject the theory of evolution they must find overwhelming evidence against it. So far they have not. What happens in this case is that the existence of God use to have an important explanatory role in the complexity of life, however this explanatory role is replaced by evolution. Some theists can insist that God guides evolution, which is fine by me but I see no need to add in God; if evolution alone can account for complexity of life without God, then why add God into the equation?

The last good example is the fine-tune universe. I won’t get too deep into this but I will make this point. The fine-tune argument is probably the more impressive argument I come across, it really almost had me. However, the argument leads to a problem. If God fine-tuned the universe for life to exist but parasites, diseases, predators, and old-age are a part of life, then God fine-tuned the universe in which life can suffer; God fine-tuned the universe in such a condition where suffering is permitted. Since God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-loving such a being should already know that fine-tuning the universe in a certain way is preventable, especially since such a being would not let things suffer needlessly. What eventually happens is that the fine-tune argument collapses into another problem of evil in the form of this question: Why did God fine-tune the universe that permits suffering if God could fine-tune the universe that could prevent it?

The skeptic does not have to present absolute proof that Big Foot does not exist, all the skeptic requires is to determine whether or not the belief is reasonably plausible. None of these arguments against theism are knock-down arguments, since the theist could change or moderate his position to avoid them yet still reasonably maintain his position. However, these arguments do make theism look like a weak position to the point of sounding unreasonable and implausible. We find that there are many reasons to doubt theism, enough to the point that the belief in the existence of God could be brought down to the lower scale of reasonableness. Believers might insist that atheists must produce absolute proof that God does not exist, however this is a bit unfair since there are many things in life that cannot be shown to be true this way. Many scientific theories were proven to be true by overwhelming evidence, but not absolute proof. After all, scientific theories can change if contrary evidence emerges. Also, not all rejected scientific theories were discarded because of absolute proof against them. Most of them were discarded because of overwhelming evidence against them, rather than some absolute proof. What rarely happens in science is that the belief that is rejected due to overwhelming evidence becomes accepted due to overwhelming evidence, this happens more rarely than scientific theories that simply were not accepted but became accepted due to overwhelming evidence.

Thus, an atheist can reasonably stand his ground by insisting that he does not need absolute proof. All he needs to show is that the belief in the existence of God is plainly unreasonable and implausible. The atheist cannot absolutely disprove the existence of god anymore than he could disprove the existence of fairies. I’m personally an agnostic atheist, since I do not claim to know whether or not God exists. However, I do claim that while it may be possible that God exists, it simply is not reasonable to believe in it due to the lack of evidence (and some contrary evidence). I am willing to keep an open mind, as long as there are good evidences and arguments. However, I just think that if God really does exist as a cosmic intervener, then there should be patterns, structures, events, or phenomena in the universe that cannot be explained by science, but could most likely be explained by the existence of God. Many theists believe this to be true, but I do not. I think that a lot of the things in the universe that is being explained by the existence of God are usually based on bad evidence produced by unreliable means (i.e. eye-witness report, anecdotal evidence, etc). It has become apparent that natural explanations are more well-supported to the point of having superior explanatory role than that of God. Many things in the universe are being explained by natural explanations, to the point that supernatural ones do not seem to have enough room to squeeze in.

Explanatory role of God is wearing thin quite quickly, soon it may evaporate. This is my intuition, as a naturalist who believes that everything in Nature must have an explanation in the contexts of Nature. I think this view is more probable than theism, since we have seen that everything that we know about the universe is explained in the context of the universe from the lower level (sub-atomic particles) to the higher levels (i.e. galaxies, black holes, expansion of universe, etc). This could change, but as far as I know it hasn’t changed so far. It appears that for now Naturalism is the more reasonable position to hold.

Christians like a good lie --and They'll Go To Hell if They Don't Believe it.

I was recently out on the Internet doing some research and happened across a link to a shame-on-us article about Ted Haggard, the infamous, scooter-riding, arrogant Mega Church preacher who on was outed for Riding the Baloney Pony and doing Meth on the side with his gay prostitute.

The article (link below) is from Christianity Today (CT), a very conservative and influential Christian magazine. (The article on CT is currently open to posting comments...)

Haggard made himself all the more famous in the world's eyes by his outspoken, arrogant and violent attitude toward Richard Dawkins and his camera crew, and by his anti-gay and anti-drug rhetoric that he spewed as if he was an authority of righteousness. Every day he duped thousands of people into thinking that what he said was the truth. He got paid very well for doing it, too. He held the hopes of thousands and betrayed them all. Like others of his religious ilk, at his core he likes a good lie.

In support of that, the CT article is written by fellow christer-buddy who was applying the usual subtle shame-based approach to everyone who reads it: well, if God forgives why haven't we?

Decoding the rhetoric: Let's give Teddy a new job. Let's give it to him, or you're guilty of acting against jesus. His buddy wrote the article during the holidays, so that it's guilt appeal could be maximized. Read some of the comments to that article and see the ones who are still conspicuously duped. They like a good lie. You do the math.

My observation: the christer club is full of leaders (and many others) who are criminally deceptive and abusive. Others in the club will use *any* tactic necessary to make sure that their criminal leaders are comfortable so that the lie can continue. Their guilt and shame-based tactics are crafted to make you feel bad that you ever thought Gay, Drug-Addict Baloney Boy ever lied or did anything wrong.

Interestingly, the only person who did the right thing was the gay prostitute. He called the Lie and The Liar for what they were.

What's you're experience?

Do Christians like a good lie?

Do you think that they would do anything to protect the lie and liar?

What could be done about that?

What could the public do about religious criminals like Haggard and his friends?

Many loyal citizens insist that our foundation originates from the Bible. They pick and choose from the private writings, even public pronouncements of the Founders as they do from the Bible itself, to bolster their claim. (This is understandable; it’s human nature to “seek and find” support for biased opinions.)

Let’s consider if the tenth commandment alone is reason enough to question the morality of a Bible-based system.

Recently, a Bible commentator pointed out something about the tenth commandment, as written in Exodus 20:17. “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house, you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or male or female slave or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” The writer asks if we noticed that all of the things mentioned in this commandment are the “property” of the male head of the household.

Indeed, if we look at the Bible, this is normal. Prominent examples are Abraham, Solomon, David, Job, Noah. (This same book/mentality, is the basis for the Muslim and Mormon religions, with their original plurality of wives.)

Since wives, slaves, donkeys are “property,” so are sons and daughters, to be used or disposed of according to the will and disposition of the owner. Thus, Abraham may kill his son, and Old Testament patriarchs sell their daughters. A father god may drown his children; for they are his property. Ultimately, they have no choice, for they belong to him.

The belief that sons, for example, are property, is not limited to the Bible, but is thought to begin with agriculture and the consequent boundaries resulting from it. Treating young men as a man’s property has had dire consequences. In the past century alone millions of young men have died as sacrifices to the wills of dictators, tyrants, and a male “divine” emperor (Hirohito in WWII Japan).

We’ve become much more civilized than those biblical writers. Wives, children, mistresses, are no longer a man’s property, nor does he own slaves, and citizens can even be prosecuted for abusing their own pets. We have become much more moral and humane.

Yet we are asked to celebrate the birth of a son who is destined to be disposed of, in a horrible death, because he is his father’s personal property. This is unacceptable in 21st century America.

There is no “War on Christmas.” I know Bill O'Reilly has insisted otherwise. I know that Rush has kept you all whipped up, and the AFA and the Million Moms (give or take several hundred thousand) have almost daily updates of the atrocities committed upon your sacred holiday. But years into your annual tradition of false persecution, it's time to look at the information in front of us all. Let's see what is really being served on your holiday table and mine.

Frankly, I'm not the only one who is sick of having you acting like you are victims of something tragic. You are not being “persecuted” for your faith. No one is trying to “destroy” anything. No one is preventing you or anyone else from celebrating Christmas, and doing it as Jesus-y as you want. In every retail outlet in the country, you can't escape Christmas. You can buy cards and wrapping paper and ornaments all emblazoned with the word in just about any given shop; you can buy Adoration scenes and Jesus-ornaments and manger snow globes at all major retailers, and you don't have to go to a back alley secret “Christmas only!” store to find it. In stores, in restaurants, in your car, you can hear publicly broadcast radio stations that play Christmas music for two solid months, with songs all about Mary and Jesus and God and herald angels and the savior and the holy spirit and Silent Nights and We Three Kings. There are two dozen movies per day airing on cable TV with Jesus-Christmas themes. You can wear your cross necklaces and your “remember the reason for the season” t-shirts. You can put up a Nativity on your front lawn. You can even include the shepherds stabbing Santa Claus and Frosty the Snowman in front of the manger with their hooks and letting their sheep eat the entrails with signs that say “It's about Jesus, not these jackasses!” if you want. Rename the green bean casserole “The Casserole of Christ” if it makes you happy. Bake Jesus a birthday cake instead of serving pumpkin pie. No one is preventing you from any of that at all.

However, if the suggestion that maybe not everyone in your community celebrates Christmas, or does it the same way you do, makes you apoplectic with rage, then maybe you might be missing the point of Christmas yourself.

There is no “liberal plot” to take away your holiday. In fact, most “liberals” would firmly advocate your right to celebrate your holiday your way. Nor is this isn't about some agenda of “political correctness” (and really, anyone who has used that phrase in earnest since 1995 hasn't been paying attention). Stop being divisive. Christmas is about love and peace. That's what Jesus was, if you know your bible like you say you do: God's ultimate gift of love, personifying the hope that the world might be united in peace some day. Read those chapters in Matthew again. Heck, even listen to those song lyrics. Why is it so difficult for you to accept that Jesus's message was to be loving and inclusive... and not just to people who share your particular religious beliefs?

Every year, there are “news” reports with your anecdotal evidence about how crazy people are depriving you of your holiday and ruining everything. EVERYTHING. It's your local news affiliate's ratings grab. The suggestion of anything other than Jesus-cetnric Christmas sends you squealing in fury about “intolerance.” Someone pointing that this country includes Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, pagans, Jedi, and Pastafarians makes you froth like rabid dogs. Don't believe me? I'm not making this up. Go to Fox News's website and look up all the stories they've tagged “War on Christmas.” Read the comments. Google “War on Christmas.”

Sorry, Christians. Christmas is not the only holiday celebrated in December. I don't care if you don't like Kwanzaa, or don't get atheists, or are offended by Muslims or Jews. I don't care if Christian rhetoric insists that Christianity SHOULD be the only religion. The fact is, it's not, and that value is one America was built on. And it's not just about religious holidays in December, either: there are also secular celebrations like the winter solstice and the New Year... in other words, “holidays,” plural. Saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” isn't some hapless retail drone's attempt to take Jesus away from you. It's acknowledging that people are celebrating a lot of different things, and in different ways. That's also an American value. And if that offends you, you are a spoiled brat, not a true Christian patriot.

No, Christmas is not the only game in town during this time of year, nor was it always Christmas, either, like you try to claim. Go ahead and try to insist “Christmas came first!” and all the other December holidays are just co-option, and I'll happily serve you an ass-full of history. Argue that the Puritans came to America to be able to celebrate Christmas, and I will point and laugh at you outright. Even if you want to insist that no one but people who believe in Jesus should celebrate Christmas, you are missing centuries of traditions and multicultural history, because, no matter what you think, even Christ's Mass itself isn't just, and has never only been, about Jesus. Spend ten minutes on Wikipedia and you can see that much. Sorry, gang, but Christmas isn't some reward that's earned by believing in Jesus; it's become an intrinsic part of Western culture. You don't get to keep it all for yourself because you don't like people who do it differently.

You don't want your tax dollars going for healthcare for poor people? Great. I don't want mine going for war or abstinence education or religious-dominant displays that exclude everyone but Christians in state-funded places. However, we don't get to pick and choose where tax money goes. You can, however, point out when “separation of church and state” is lacking. Most atheists don't object to your crosses and mangers. Many of us do, however, object to them being on government property, with state funds, and at the exclusion of non-Christians. And I'm going to hazard a guess that if the city wanted to put up a display honoring Ramadan, you would lose your collective minds. Furthermore, if you can scream about how wrong it is for there to be no Jesus in the schools' history books or for a school to teach sex ed. because that is “against your personal beliefs,” then you damned well better accept that the flip side of that is that some parents don't want their children attending school sponsored Jesus-centric Christmas plays.

Bottom line is, Christmas is supposed to be a time of peace and love, of giving and hope, hope that even for one day out of the year, all of us disparate groups of people can come together, however briefly, and feel that maybe generosity trumps selfishness. Ironic, isn't it, that every year, Christians from all corners of the US of A are ready to rally around pop culture figures getting ratings for their TV and radio shows, agreeing wholeheartedly that THEIR holiday is better than all those other holidays, and should be the ONLY one allowed, and to THEIR specifications. How many times do Christians, in the name of their religion, insist that anyone who doesn't believe exactly what they believe should not be allowed to have anything to do with Christmas? Read some of those aforementioned op ed pieces or blog things; check out how many times Christians insist “respect our faith!” in the middle of logical fallacies about “you are wrong, there is no Christmas without Jesus!” and “if you don't believe in Jesus, you will burn in hell!” “My way or the highway,” Christians, and all in the name of what is supposed to be a holiday, a holy day, of unselfishness. Go, you guys.

But okay. If you are still going to stamp your feet and argue that every non-Jesus thing that happens in the month of December is a personal affront to you, then there are many, many options available to you here in America. If you want your children to sing “Away in a Manger” at school pageants, send them to Christian school. If you think that Christmas should be all about Jesus, go ahead and wear that “He the Reason for the Season” pin on your “Happy Birthday, Jesus” sweatshirt. If you want everyone everywhere to celebrate Christmas as the only holiday, and do it the way you do, then do what many Christians have done historically, and go found your next “City on a Hill” someplace away from this godless nation that has disappointed you so. There are plenty of islands, or you can chip in with a bunch of the other “War on Christmas” people and get a decommissioned aircraft carrier and rename it the “SS Jesus is God.” See if O'Reilly will sponsor you.

Or, better yet, take your own advice: Quit whining.

Merry Whatever, everyone!

*Note: Believe me, I know that not all Christians are on board with this “War on Christmas” thing. I know plenty of wonderful Christians who have no problem saying “Happy Christmakwazukkah” or even saying “Merry Christmas” and receiving a “Happy Holidays” in return. I know plenty of wonderful non-Christians who see hope and beauty in a manger scene or “O Holy Night.” The bottom line is, the “War on Christmas” is not only a giant lie, the people who you think are attacking your Jesusness are probably on board with you celebrating however you want.

First of all, I come from a very religious family. My dad has always been intensely involved in the church and my whole family are rock solid Christians... all but me.

I recently came out to my mom and brother about not believing in God. It was hard, and they said they'll pray for me :|

Anyway, how Christianity makes my life hard, is the way it makes them think, and the decisions they make, that sometimes effect me. I have two brothers: The oldest is an (ex) drug user, religious fanatic, and a bit reckless. The middle one is a very hard working guy, that has always been looking out for himself and not screwing up. I am the youngest, kind of in between those two, except for the drugs and religion.

Now the history with my eldest brother is that he always got himself back into drugs and then he would reach a stage where god 'saves' him. 'God has taken me back into his arms, after the devil tempted me.' My belief has always been that if he didn't believe in these two extremes, he would actually start taking responsibility for himself, and I seriously believe that his case has been one of the biggest contributing factors to in me not believing.

Now what recently happened was that my middle brother decided to leave his business and become a missionary for a couple of years. That's all good, I don't fight him on that, he must do what he feels is right for him. He worked hard and has a nest egg saved, plus his an engineer that can easily get a job with his record...

But now my older brother has jumped on tha band waggon, not actually to go be a missionary, no, he just quit his job and now wants to go live with my parents and study the bible for a couple of months. ?

If I came from a rich family with loads of resources I would not be so concerned about this, and he would just be my screw-up brother. BUT, my dad has an illness, something similar to Alzheimer's. He lives with my mother and they are both pensioners with no cash to spare.

What concerns me is that at this moment I am the only one in my family with a job that pays, and If anything should happen the whole wreck will fall squarely on my shoulders.

He's bound to go back to the 'dark-side' sooner or later where he'd spend all his money and I'll have to bail him out. This makes me angry. This God Illusion makes me angry, that now.

“The remarkable thing about God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God, you fear everything else.” ― Oswald Chambers

Even though I'm 99.9% sure that December 21, 2012 is not the Last Day, I'm having an End of the World party at my house tomorrow night.

To tell the truth, I am a little afraid - not that the world will end, but that life goes on and I have relatively little control over whatever the future might hold for me and my family.

As most readers at No Longer Quivering know, I no longer count myself among the God-fearing faithful. When I was a Believer, I honestly thought that I was fearless - not that there was nothing to be afraid of - to the contrary, as a Christian, I had all the usual anxiety of living in an uncertain modern-world-gone-mad compounded by the added terrors particular to Evangelical culture; namely, the World, the Flesh, and the Devil - all of which, I believed, were aligned against God and doggedly determined to steal, kill, and destroy my eternal soul, and my precious children's souls too!

BUT ... I regularly consoled myself with inspiring and comforting words from scripture such as, "Perfect love casts out fear," "God has not given us a spirit of fear," "When I am afraid, I will trust in You," and my personal favorite from Isaiah 41:10 "So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

So every night, I said my prayers, trusted God ... and slept peacefully, believing myself and my children were safe and secure in God's protective love.

And what about now? What consolation is there in unbelief when things go horribly wrong as they did last week in Newtown, Connecticut? When I read about the cold-blooded, execution-style mass murder of the Sandy Hook elementary school children and their teachers and would-be protectors, I confess that I wanted to pray.

I wanted to pray for my own children; for their safety and their sanity. And I wanted to pray for myself ... because as the mother of seven children, I feel vulnerable and afraid.

I mean, as a divorced mom, what can I do, really, to ensure that my kids are protected? How can I be sure that one of my own white male sons won't one day go off the deep end and inflict unspeakable carnage on family, classmates, or co-workers?

Trust in God? ... believe me, it's tempting. Especially because I have actually experienced that "peace which passeth understanding" and I know how comforting it is to simply trust and obey.

According to Christian apologist, Ray Comfort, America's gone crazy because as a nation, we've lost the fear of God.

The bible tells us that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom ... but "we have had British Redcoats invade our nation, and shoot at youth through the heart. Men like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens ... have come in with these smooth English accents and have convinced millions of young people that they're nothing but primates. There's no ultimate right, there's no ultimate wrong. And when that happens to a nation, when they make them into God haters, something dies within a nation, and that's what has happened in America."

"When a man can go to an elementary school and shoot people, including children to death, and then shoot himself, he doesn't fear God in the slightest."

But what if it's actually the other way around? What if we fear God because America's gone crazy?

Chris Hedges, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School and author of American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, says "those in despair search desperately for a solution, the warm embrace of a community ... a sense of purpose and meaning in life, the assurance they are protected, loved and worthwhile."

For myself, I know this is true. In the past, during those times when I have felt overwhelmed by my lack of control over life's unpredictability, it was always nice to think that so long as I was in the center of God's will ("The Hiding Place" according to Corrie ten Boom), my loved ones and I would be safe; shielded and protected by the One Who is all-wise and all-powerful and all-loving.

Maybe I can't get a grip on life, but if I can somehow convince The Almighty to take control on my behalf ...

Of course, the reality of my circumstances never actually changed - it's only a very clever mind game and I have lost the ability to play this trick on myself.

So now I'm just scared.

But I've come to recognize the value of apprehension - because fear which is not squelched or pacified by the mental hocus pocus of pious devotion can be a great motivation for necessary change. Without the thought-stopping effect of 365 biblical "fear-nots," these days, when I am afraid, I have no other option than to actually figure out: What is so terrifying? Why am I scared? What should be done to prevent my fears from materializing in reality? What do I need to do differently?

I readily admit that not having chapter and verse and the prompting of the Holy Spirit to tell me how to raise all these kids is a challenge. When I first realized that I no longer believe in God or the authority of His Word, I fully expected to wake up one morning and feel so completely lost and overwhelmed by the responsibility of parenting a quiver full of children "in my own strength," that I would just give up. And I'm sure that I would have, except I didn't know how to "give up" when I had little ones who needed me and who simply expected me to keep doing the mom thing.

So I did the mom thing.

At first, I literally had to force myself to think. I was so accustomed to having a ready response, a sure-fire formula, a one-size fits all solution ... and if all else failed, I could always pray about the problem and turn it over to God. What would Nancy Campbell do? Naturally, she would smile and do the next thing ... (✿◠‿◠)

Thinking requires a lot of effort - ugh! And it's especially bothersome when the lid is lifted off the box of my "biblical worldview" into which I'd confined my range of thinking and suddenly all possible options are open for consideration. If the kid's problem isn't necessarily a matter of sin or demonic oppression, maybe there's something physical (too tired, poor nutrition, chronic pain?) or psychological such as depression, ADHD, or a learning disability (what?!! label my kid?) ...heck - it could just be that my children are immature and need to be given the freedom and space to live and learn.

Sans my former fundamentalist mindset, the only thing I definitely know for absolute certain is that there are no guarantees. Yes, I must "train up" my children, but ultimately, there's no way I can control what they will choose to do with their lives, and I'm not counting on God to keep them in line either.

It's a scary prospect, but that's the reality of raising kids these days. Ironically, there is a sense of peace that comes from facing our parental fears and even embracing the iffiness of life. There's a lot of speculation going on across the Internet about where we went wrong, who's to blame, how could we have prevented the monstrous atrocity of the Sandy Hook massacre? The introspection is good and necessary, but obviously, there is no single solution, no one problem that we can readily pinpoint and correct. The truth is, we just don't know what really happened or why.

Maybe my adventure in parenting a whole passel of kids will end in a crash-and-burn disaster and I'll go down in history as the mother of the next Adam Lanza. Odds are, it won't happen - just as it's unlikely that tomorrow will actually be the End of the World. But faced with such terrifying scenarios, however remotely possible, why not "eat, drink, and be merry"? Not because tomorrow we die, but rather, tomorrow we're likely to live ... and like it or not, there's really no predicting how that's going to work out for us.

At this time of year it’s hard to avoid dealing with the differences you have with your family. If you are a “reclaimer” (reclaiming your life after being religious) who has been raised in a religious household, holiday times can be very uncomfortable when other family members are still devout. Having worked through these issues with many clients, here are a few guidelines that might be helpful.

I’ll start by suggesting you write in a journal, starting now and continuing through the holidays. This can help you sort through jumbled thoughts and emotions, stay on track with how you are trying to handle things, take care of yourself, and learn. There are exercises here to prompt your thinking.

In general, if you plan to be with family at this time, it helps a great deal to approach the holidays with a high level of consciousness. In other words, don’t just blindly go home for Christmas, hoping it will be fine. What do you really expect it might be like? This refers to both external factors and how you will feel. What experiences have you had so far with your family? What have you found to work or not work in getting along? Write something about this in your journal.

Sometimes reclaimers simply avoid going home in order to avoid conflict. At times this is the only healthy course of action. But sometimes, by planning ahead, it can be possible to navigate around the land mines. The difference in this approach, compared to simply not showing up, is that you are acting out of reasoned choice and not out of fear or anger.

In the process of recovering from the harm done by religious indoctrination, most people reach a point at which they must weigh “coming out” as a nonbeliever because the tension of “integrity vs. intimacy” becomes too much. That is, the urge to be true to oneself becomes stronger than the need for approval required to stay close to family members. It does not need to happen right away, and can take a variety of forms. However, holiday time puts pressure on your relationships, and it could raise this question for you. If you haven’t already, spend some time thinking about whether this is the time to come out with family. It may or may not be. There are also degrees of being “out” and probably different family members to consider being more or less open with about your new thoughts and feelings.

Here’s a basic plan for coping. There are external action items, as well as internal or mental techniques. You may notice a bonus here, which is that there are great lessons to learn that apply to your growth and recovery generally.

Preparation

Clarify Intention

As you think about what you want to do, realize that you do not have an obligation to spend holiday time with family. (What?) If you commit not to do anything out of guilt or obligation, this will make it easier to choose what amount of contact you want and what form it will take. You need to let your parents take responsibility for their own feelings, which are often the result of choices they have made in their own lives. It doesn’t mean you have to be unkind. You can certainly be empathic in your expression, such as, “I know you would like me to be home for Christmas and this is a surprise, and I’m sorry you feel disappointed. At the same time, spending it on my own this year is what I feel is best for me, and I’m hoping you will accept that.” You can also suggest alternative plans for what you think is workable – the number of days, phone contact instead, inviting them to your place, etc.

If this sounds like you being the grown-up, that’s right. Especially if you are in early stages of recovering from religion, you are learning about taking care of yourself. In the language I use for this, your Adult self is learning to take charge and care for your Child self. You are no longer considering yourself helpless, weak, stupid, or basically bad. You don’t need saving and you don’t need to outsource your needs for guidance and love to a god or church. This is great and freeing; it’s also a big responsibility. When you go visit your parents, your Adult absolutely needs to take good care of your Child. Otherwise, it is all too easy to regress to a childlike state and have problems fairly immediately.

Let me explain a bit more about this, because this is a powerful coping strategy. Your Adult is the part of you that can think rationally, have intention, and plan ahead. It’s also the part that can nurture and care for your Child self by advocating for your Child’s needs. So, before you even start on this visit, you, as an adult, can think about your Intention for this visit. Do you want it to be a jolly Christmas just like when you were a kid, with Santa and hot chocolate? Are you going to church on Christmas Eve? Why or why not? How will you handle it? Will you be discussing your beliefs? Do you want any religion at all? Why do you want to go? What are you hoping for that is actually possible? What are you willing to let go of that is not possible? Do you want to engage in debates? Will you be “coming out”? If you are asked about who you are now or what you believe, how will you answer?

Writing exercise: Write out your intentions for your visit.

Self-care

Now, as you know, the best of intentions don’t always work out. That’s why you feel nervous. In the self-care terminology I’m using, it’s your Child that’s scared, and it’s my opinion that your real obligation is to make sure that your Child feels safe, both before and during the visit. (This usage of “Child” refers to the natural, innocent, child-like, emotional aspect of you that requires love and care, and is vulnerable. It was not sinful at birth, and when healed from abusive indoctrination, can be happy and healthy.) This might mean taking breaks in order to self-soothe with some positive self-talk. Ultimately, it would include promising to simply leave if the situation became too uncomfortable. I always explain to my clients that as they are healing, the trust between Adult and Child needs to strengthen, so a good thing is to promise your Child that you will take her/him away if a situation gets bad or painful, just like you would a real child who was struggling.

Christmas is often a little tender for an inner child since there might be memories of good things, sadness over losses, or confusion at this time. If you spend a little time consulting your Child about what aspects of the holiday you still want to experience, what do you find? Making cookies? Writing cards to family and friends? Singing? Playing in the snow? Cutting paper snow flakes? If you want to avoid the commercialism of too much gift buying, are there substitutes you prefer? If you are not just a victim of the holiday, what might you accept or arrange for your little self to enjoy? Or what would you help others enjoy? For ideas about celebrating and reclaiming the Christmas holiday as a nonbeliever, go Here for a new article by Valerie Tarico.

Imagining various scenarios, what do you think your options might be if you get overwhelmed by your relatives’ religious talk? Can you excuse yourself, take a break, change the subject, focus on something else? Do you need to bring anything along to help? A game or puzzle?

Writing exercise: Write a letter to your Child from your Adult self, explaining how you will provide protection during the visit, and promising to leave if necessary. Describe the fun things that will be included. Talk about what you will do if you are getting triggered by too much religiosity. Make a list of options you will have ready.

Reframe the Religion

Especially if your family is very devout and authoritarian about their beliefs, you need to have a way of thinking about their religion that is different from the way you did as a child. That may sound obvious because intellectually you have decided you don’t believe any more. However, when in the situation, you may respond emotionally, and even intensely. This is not because you have reverted to “believing” but because you can be triggered at a gut level to fear that it is true. Rethinking this belief system is a larger task of recovery that can take time and work, and is very important. For now, the challenge is to be in your old environment and not slip into being your old self or be intimidated by old forces. You can prepare by thinking about what this religion is – e.g., a belief system like many other ancient systems that has evolved to help people cope with what they don’t understand, a virus, a meme complex, etc. Anything but The Truth. Even if it feels true because everyone around you is treating it like the truth. Hundreds of years ago everyone believed the earth was flat, it looked flat, and it felt flat. But that wasn’t true either.

Thinking about the religion as the source of the conflict, difference, pain, and separation in your family (or at least part of it), may help you feel less direct anger or frustration with the people involved. As a virus, religion propagates by getting passed on to small children, and continues through generations. Essentially, your parents were infected and thus victims as well. They did not have these religious ideas at birth, and even now, they each have an inner child too (weird, huh?) You were fortunate to escape, and also to be congratulated for finding your way out! A holiday visit is probably not the time to go deep into family work, so I’m not suggesting you look for understanding each other, find forgiveness, or anything else that is complicated. However, just knowing that your family members did not invent this very pernicious system might help you relax and have a bit of compassion. It does mean that you did not suffer or that your issues will not ever be addressed.

Writing exercise: Before you head for a family get-together, write about how you conceptualize your religion now, and review your reasons for leaving. How does it feel to view your relatives in the context of larger forces?

Communicate clearly with family

After sorting through all your thoughts and feelings, you need to state clearly to your relatives your intentions for your time together. This is before you leave home. I suggest this be done simply and from the heart, and say more, not less. Include all of your feelings – your nervousness, your hesitation, your hopes, your fears, your love, your clarity about limits. It helps to write it down first, or rehearse it with someone. Here’s an example. You would alter it to suit you of course. I’ve written it as if a monologue, but it would be broken up to allow the other person to speak.

“Hi Mom, I’ve been trying to decide what to do about Christmas and this is hard for me to talk about. I’m a bit worried I don’t have the right words, so please be patient with me here. (deep breath). The last thing I want to do is upset you, and I know that you might have to get used to what’s happening with me. I’ve changed so much and not always comfortable being around family. . . I’m sure you went through a lot of growing up changes when you were my age too. . . . I hope you can understand. . . anyway I do want to see you guys and I want to have a nice time. I love you. I know you want to see me. . . I won’t be staying for a full week like usual; it’ll just be three days. . . I just need a bit of time for myself this year. . . yes, I can hear that you are disappointed, and I’m sorry about that. . . I do want to make the time we have together the best we can, and I have some suggestions about that. We always enjoy hikes in the woods so lets remember to do that, ok? And here’s something important - I’d like to keep our conversations to what we are doing in our regular lives, and of course chat about what we are doing together in the moment, like making your famous pecan pie, which I want to learn, by the way. I’d like to stay away from religion for now since I’m sorting that out for myself and I’m not comfortable discussing it. I know that this isn’t easy for you but I’m hoping you can accept it so that I can feel relaxed. . . I certainly don’t want to be avoiding you or avoiding a visit on Christmas. I just have to be honest, you know? Also, I won’t be going to church on Christmas Eve. But I’d love to babysit the grandkids and play games with them while you are out. Do you have any more ideas? Anything you’d like me to bring?”

Naturally, you would be pausing to listen to let the other party speak and respond with empathy. That is, gently and with understanding rephrase what you have heard so they know that you are listening. At the end of the call, it’s okay to ask them to repeat back to you what you have said, e.g. “Could you do something for me before we finish? This is important to me and I’ll be much more relaxed if I feel sure I’ve communicated well. Could you please repeat back to me what you think I’m asking so I can know if I’ve been clear?” And of course, “Thank-you, I appreciate it,” etc.

Writing exercise: Write out what you want to say to your family when you discuss your holiday plans.

Support

Have a buddy. While you prepare for this visit, talk it over with someone who understands. This may be a fellow “reclaimer” or just a good friend. They can help by role-playing your phone conversation with family and also be there to listen to just your side of the conversation. This helps you to see yourself in part through their eyes rather than just through the eyes of the person on the other end of the call.

During your family visit as well, it’s a good idea to arrange to have someone available to you to talk and get support. At a time of stress, you might well benefit from calling this friend.

Back-up plan. If you know that the visit might not go well, and you might have to leave in order to take care of yourself, plan ahead for what you will do. Set up a clear plan for where you will go and what pleasant activities you have in mind.

Writing exercise: Describe what you will do instead if your family visit ends early.

During the Visit

Maintain intention

Bring along your journal and have your written intention handy to reread to remind yourself. You will probably need this. Most people find it challenging to stay “Adult” when certain situations call for it. Being with religious family is usually one of them. This is not to say your Child cannot play and hopefully there will be opportunity for that. But to stay safe, and feel like you are maintaining who you are now, rereading your intentions will help. You can add to the journaling of course, and you will notice developments. One of them will be to relate to family members with new awareness. You may have some new compassion for a cousin who seem stuck in the faith, for example. Or you may see how your mother obeys your father and represses her own expression. If your intention is “to spend some quality time with close family members and keep connected,” you can concentrate on that and not drift into debates.

Staying with your intentions may also include repeating yourself to others. What you said at the beginning before coming to the holiday gathering may need restating, to more than one person, and more than one time. If you aren’t afraid to do this, and express yourself with both compassion and assertiveness, your sense of self will begin to feel more self-defined and less vulnerable.

Step Back

Play anthropologist. Once you have recognized that religion is a huge meme complex that takes on a power of its own, you can view people within that system from that perspective. Other reclaimers I’ve known have found it very useful to visit family and maintain some distance by pretending to have the viewpoint of an anthropologist. This attitude is nonjudgmental, curious, and unemotional. An anthropologist often takes the role of “participant observer” in order to gain access to a group, and learn about their customs. So you can watch everyone bow their heads, close their eyes and speak to an imaginary being, and find that very interesting without freaking out. They might all go off to celebrate the child of this imaginary being who was born thousands of years ago, and has somehow saved them. Fascinating. The songs are also quite amazing in the stories they tell.Writing exercise: As a social scientist, describe in your journal what you are learning about this culture you are observing. Let yourself enjoy the quirky things you are noticing.

Translate the words. Now sometimes it can get more personal, and that when it’s more challenging. How do you feel when you are asked, “Where are you fellowshipping now?” We forget how arbitrary the Christian symbols and terms are in the vast array of mythological options. How about the Greek gods or Atlantis or Rama and Sita? What about Australian “little people,” Irish leprechauns, and faeries? You can diffuse the heavy loading of Christian language by translating words in your head. When your father asks you, “How’s your walk with the Lord?”, you can hear “How’s your walk with the leprechaun king?” and “When did you go to church last?” translates “When did you last dance with the faeries in the moonlight?” If they read the Bible together, you can see them in a cave poring over ancient leprechaun scriptures. Of course they believe all of it, and you won’t be able to convince them otherwise. More importantly, you don’t need to get scared, or even angry. When you reply, “That’s not really part of my life anymore,” you can do so calmly, as if you just don’t make treks into the forest to see fairies at midnight any longer.

Writing exercise: Describe what it is like to reinterpret Christian messages and respond accordingly.

It’s not all about you. Much as these relationship issues may hurt, the truth is that it’s not personal. Religion itself causes separation between people, it causes dogmatism, and it makes it very difficult for people to listen, change, or learn. This religion your family has is much bigger than you. So if you do not take it personally, you will be much happier. Try to breathe and bring some equanimity to the situation, knowing that you have done nothing wrong.

Step UpStay with your values. Regardless of what is happening, do what you want to do because that is what you have decided. For example, if everyone wants to do more shopping, and you want some fun time with the children, choose that. Reclaim your holiday. Remember why you decided to make the visit. Do what brings you and others joy and meaning. Connect as humans. That may sound funny but the truth is religious people develop dual personalities. One lives in a “spiritual” world of angels and demons and worries about sin and an afterlife. The other is an ordinary human being like you and me who likes to eat good food, needs love, watches movies, appreciates sunsets, hates traffic jams, and will help rescue a kitten. That person likes compliments, wants to feel needed, etc. There are personality differences, but basic human needs are the same and you can stick to this human level as you relate. In fact, I’ve found that many religious people actually appreciate being treated in a deeply genuine way. Like everyone else, they like to be heard, they want to matter, and they need to have their thoughts and feelings count. So the best way to get along, believe it or not, is to ignore their religion. Simply focus on the human side of life, and if they bring up religious things, bring it back to reality. If that doesn’t work, take a break, and/or repeat your intention like I describe in the beginning.Let go of approval. A leftover from religious training is to judge absolutely everything. This includes evaluating yourself, and being concerned about what other people think. Yet, you’ll find that it is extremely liberating to do what you consider the right thing to do simply because it fits with your identity and your integrity. We often want others to appreciate us when we do good things. And in this case, if you are working very hard to become the person you really want to be, it would be nice to get acceptance, if not approval. But if you let go of that you can get satisfaction from choosing to act in harmony with your new, self-chosen values regardless of others’ reaction. Then, if your family sees you and understands you, great. If not, you have done a marvelous thing by just being with them and being yourself. It also helps to not take yourself too seriously. Don’t forget to enjoy the lighter side of your connections with others.

A word of caution and congratulations

Don’t set yourself up to do everything well. You will do some things well and other things will go awry. If all went seamlessly, that would be weird. If you have to leave early, that is fine. Go to Plan B like you planned and enjoy yourself. Take care of your Child above all.

If there is a family blow-up, so be it. Everything is process. No matter what, you and everyone else will learn. Sometimes intense emotions just have to be expressed. Sometimes family crises just have to happen, just like forest fires are a natural part of a cycle. It’s no one’s fault. It certainly helps to hang on to your sense of humor. No matter what, you are on a journey, and you are growing and healing and reclaiming your life.

Writing exercise: Don’t miss out on lessons learned. Write about what this was like for you and how you grew from the experience. In addition to the serious bits, include the funny parts.

Dealing with your family during the holidays is a step in your journey. It takes courage to recover from religion so again, I congratulate you.

Marlene Winell, Ph.D. works with people recovering from religious indoctrination. She can be reached through Journey Free at http://journeyfree.org.

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